Marathon Tires - Look for the Circle S

A large Goodyear tire dealer gave me the following info on trailer tires.

If you have Goodyear Marathon Radials - check the tire to see if there is a letter "S" inside a circle immediately following the word radial. The tire is marked - Goodyear Marathon Radial S (with the S inside a circle).

If there is no circled S, Goodyear will replace the tire at no charge regardless of age.

The tires made without the circle S are know to have defects and Goodyears wants them off.

When I asked the dealer which tire is the best choice, he replied Goodyear, because they will always pay for the damage to the trailer caused by a Goodyear tire failure. You only have to get two estimates and Goodyear pays.

He reports that the updated Marathon is failing less than any of his other brands and having Goodyear pay for any damage makes the Goodyear choice a no brainer.

I can't find either an 's' or a circle on our 2 year old TM. Any idea what this means?

I don't even see the word "radial." Just Goodyear Marathon is very large letters. My TM is less than a year old.

Who is the "Large Goodyear Dealer", and where did this info come from?

My 3124 KS was built in Sept of 2006. I purchased it a few weeks ago so I am assuming these are the original tires. The size is ST 225/75R15.

I will contact the dealer again next week for additional info.

[ShrimpBurrito]

Mike -

If you want to see when you tire was made, look for a 4-digit sequence inside an oval on the wire. I think it is only on one side. The sequence gives you the manufacturing date, with the first 2 numbers giving the week number and the last 2 numbers giving the year. So you can tell if they are the original tires.

For example, 1406 means the tire was made the 14th week of the year (end of March?) in 2006.

Dave

If true, then this is major news for a couple of reasons. First, I haven't read anything anywhere about a Goodyear Marathon replacement policy. Second, of all the Marathon failures which have been reported, has anyone had Goodyear pay to have the damage repaired??? Very interesting post...

[Bill]

No sign of an "S" on my 15-inch Goodyears, either, although it says "radial" in several places. I'm sure Bobby will straighten it out when he returns from wherever he is gallivanting.

Bill

[MudDog]

Unless history is repeating itself, it appears this "silent recall" dates back to at least 2001 and probably applies only to older Marathons:


http://www.trailerlife.com/forums/in...tid/266944.cfm

http://www.rv.net/forum/index.cfm/fu.../tid/14110.cfm

My 14" Marathons (47th week of 2007) only say Marathon...they do not say radial and do not have the "S"

--jim

Originally Posted by Bill

No sign of an "S" on my 15-inch Goodyears, either, although it says "radial" in several places. I'm sure Bobby will straighten it out when he returns from wherever he is gallivanting.

Bill

Hmmm, this is interesting. I'm not a certified Goodyear dealer, and accordingly, wouldn't be privy to any internal "silent recalls" (or "customer satisfaction adjustments/CSA" as they are more commonly known as).

One of my real good friends is a Goodyear dealer and I'll see what he can tell me. I've read lately somewhere about Goodyear doing a CSA on some G159 tires on the big rv's.

A CSA in the tire world kinda works like some Technical Service Bulletins/TSB in the auto world. The manufacturer is aware of a problem, and informs their dealers of it. Sometimes they will pay for the fix, but usually don't advertise it, and then only pay for it IF the customer is aware of the TSB and complains. It depends on the volume and scope of how many tires are included in a CSA, on how well publicized the CSA becomes. I know that Goodyear this year had a CSA on size 215/70R14 tires across about 20 different brand lines, that were all manufactured in one plant. They even put a notice of this CSA on their own webpage......so it wasn't very "silent". By them doing this, they also headed off the NHTSA ordering a full recall on that tire.